


Aerie

by sabinelagrande



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Alternate Universe - High School, M/M, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-07
Updated: 2012-05-07
Packaged: 2017-11-04 23:48:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,241
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/399562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sabinelagrande/pseuds/sabinelagrande
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clint's the kid who doesn't fit in; Phil's the kid who doesn't stand out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Aerie

Clint mostly flew under Phil's radar until Phil became a prefect, which was when cat herding became Phil's job. It isn't that nobody likes Clint; it's just that Clint isn't particularly well-liked. He's kind of a weird kid, a scholarship case, never went to school before Hogwarts and still doesn't quite get how it works even after four years here. There are more than a few people who think he shouldn't be in Ravenclaw at all, that he's just not smart enough; maybe they're right, because he's not smart in the same ways. The other Ravenclaws, well, there's a reason their house has a reputation for being stuffy and aloof. Their citations have citations, and with some of them, you're never really sure what language you're going to get an assignment in if you don't specify.

Clint's not like that at all. He's a genius, but he's a practical one; his brain isn't clouded up with pretension and traditional thinking. He looks in and sees the heart of a problem, straight in and without failure. It's kind of refreshing, sometimes, to deal with him instead of other people; on the other hand, being the different kid comes with fighting the pack. While the passive aggression of Ravenclaw House is legendary, Clint doesn't go in for that, which makes him harder to wrangle just in general. 

Phil likes him, though. He's interesting.

Phil's reading for Charms when there's a polite cough at his elbow; he looks up to see Penelope Clearwater, a third-year who's as smart as she is officious, which is alternately good and bad. In a few years he is going to very gratefully pass the prefectship to her, but it's probably going to be because they've locked him up. "The hawk's in his nest again. He's scaring the first years."

It sounds like James Bond whenever anyone calls Clint that, but it's a fifty-fifty shot that they'll even find it funny if he says so. "I'll talk to him," Phil says, without any kind of bitterness, without feeling put-upon, because fighting fires is his day to day responsibility, and he takes his responsibilities _very_ seriously.

Phil doesn't know much at all about architecture, but he knows the dome at the top of the Common Room is called a cupola; under the ring that surrounds it, there are rafters, big beams, the wood ancient and dark. This is where Clint likes to sit, sometimes reading, very occasionally dive-bombing people with enchanted paper airplanes.

Phil climbs the stairs and stands under him, far enough to the side that he can make sort of odd eye contact. "Barton?" he says, and Clint looks down at him.

"Are you going to make me come down?" Clint says suspiciously.

Phil frowns. "Are you going to hurt yourself?"

"No," Clint says, sounding offended.

"Then no." Phil takes a look around; he can't get up to where Clint is, isn't sure how he did it exactly, but there's an alcove that's closer and looks deep enough for him to sit on. He climbs up, mindful of the distance from the floor but not too scared of it. "You just sitting up here?"

"Pretty much," he says; he hasn't even got a book today, just sitting up here doing nothing that Phil can see.

"You just like it up here?" Phil asks; he's not sure how long he could stay up here. He's not acrophobic, but the view is kind of vertiginous, enough so to be distracting. 

"Yeah," Clint says, shrugging. "I see better from a distance."

Phil looks at him curiously. "What do you see, exactly?"

"Anna M. is reading something with a fake slipcover on it," he says, pointing. "I think it's probably a romance novel, the way she keeps looking around. Jackson and Mark are copying off of one another- dunno what, but probably that transfiguration assignment, it was a real bitch. They do it a lot though, probably won't get caught. Bruce is still hopelessly in love with Betty, who definitely knows, and he thinks she doesn't notice how he keeps looking up at her over his scroll." He cranes his neck. "And Natasha snuck in again."

Phil peers down, as best he can without dislodging himself, and he doesn't see any of that, just people sitting around, reading and working- though now he sees Natasha, sitting off to the side talking to Jasper, wearing a Ravenclaw sweater and tie. "She's got to quit doing that."

"Tell her yourself," Clint says, snorting. "As long as the door runs on riddles, the Slytherins are going to keep getting in." He turns, throwing one of his legs over the rafter so that he's straddling it, facing Phil. "But it sure keeps the Hufflepuffs and the Gryffindors out." Clint gives him kind of a funny look, amused. "You're smiling."

Phil raises an eyebrow at him. "Am I not supposed to be smiling?"

"You grin and you smirk a lot," he says, "but you don't usually smile."

"It's kind of creepy, how you do that," Phil tells him.

"It's kind of creepy when you smile," Clint fires back, and Phil can't tell if he's upset or not.

"Fair enough," Phil says, and Clint seems to relax a little. "You mind if I stay up here for a while?"

"Are you asking if you can sit with me, or if you can sit near my hiding place?" Clint says.

"You're not very hidden," Phil tells him. "I came up here because the first years can spot you."

"Damn," Clint says. "Then I'm going to have to find a new hiding place."

"You should have at least two," Phil tells him. "As the light changes, it's going to show you and hide you."

Clint looks at him in disbelief. "I can't believe I didn't think of that." He shakes his head. "Thanks. But you never answered my question."

"Can't it be both?" Phil says, trying to sound casual.

"Not really," Clint says. "Pretty sure you're putting up with sitting three meters in the air so you can talk to me. You look a little green."

Phil's heart is beating fast; he doesn't quite know what that means, but he's pretty sure the height doesn't have a lot to do with it. "I guess you caught me," he says.

Clint grins. "Go on, get down," he says, and Phil does; Clint stands up on the beam, which is absolutely terrifying, and walks down it like it's nothing at all, swinging off it and using Phil's seat as a foothold on his way down. 

He lands on his feet in front of Phil, and Phil's never been this close to him before; his heart is doing that thing again. "What are those cards you're always looking at?" he asks. "The ones that look like chocolate frog cards."

"They're trading cards," Phil says. "Like muggle chocolate frog cards. I've spent a long time collecting them."

"Can I see?" Clint asks, and Phil's kind of taken aback; nobody's ever been curious before.

"Sure," Phil says. He cocks his head towards the dormitories. "They're up in my footlocker." Clint gives him a confused look, and Phil kicks himself. "My chest, I mean."

"Let's go," Clint says, and he looks excited, in kind of an infectious way. He takes off and Phil follows along behind him.

This is not how this was intended to go, but Phil thinks it might be much better this way.


End file.
